I switched on the wondrous (where would we be without it?) Radio National. I chanced upon Brian Eno’s John Peel lecture for the wondrous (where would we be without it?) BBC. Here are three quotes that spoke to my Arty Soul:

‘Now my first point is to say that children learn through play, but adults play through art. So I don’t think we stop playing. I think we just carry on doing it, but we do it through this thing called art.’

Love it. I’m forever rummaging around in the treasure chest of child’s play for the source of adult art-making. Mr Eno summarises it for me – for us?

Quotable quote number two:

‘So one of the things about art is it offers a safe place for you to have quite extreme and rather dangerous feelings.’

Kaboom! The whole of art therapy summed up in one sentence? OK. I’m going overboard with my enthusiasm, but that’s how it feels.

Quote number three:

So my thought the other night, when I was walking home was new ideas are articulated by individuals, but generated by communities. What we tend to do is – perhaps quite naturally – celebrate the individuals. We’re very keen on the names. But what we don’t do is to look at the whole community that they’re drawing from.

I wish you a peaceful, joyful Christmas/Chanukah/Solstice/Festive Season. And a happy new creatively fulfilling year.

Be sure. Be affirmed. Be proud of your involvement in the making of art – the building of worlds – the feeding and watering of imagination. Don’t feel you are wasting time on unforgivable self-indulgence when you let yourself play with the materials at hand. You are doing so…so much more.